


If I breathe you, will it kill me?

by Lyonface



Series: Paring Figs - P5R Omegaverse AU [2]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: Age Difference, Akira is an Omega, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Alpha/Omega/Alpha, Angst, Bloodlust appropriate for Akechi, Cuckolding, Eiffel Tower, Exhibitionism, Extremely Dubious Consent, Feral Behavior, Kinda Hurt No Comfort, Knotting, M/M, Maruki and Akechi are Alphas, Omegaverse, Persona 5: The Royal, Pheromones, Protagonist goes by Akira Kurusu, Protagonist is 17, References to past heat, Rimming, Rutting, Scent Kink, Third Semester (Persona 5), Trope: Have Sex to Avoid Disaster, Very brief implied rape fantasy, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-14 20:28:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29052141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyonface/pseuds/Lyonface
Summary: Check The Tags for Content Warnings!--“Joker,” Akechi warned, trying to cool down his temper, “I don’t know what you think you’re--”Joker took a deep breath through his nose, which alarmed Akechi and seemed to do something else to Maruki, who covered his own nose on reflex and started to tremble, but before Akechi could chastise him, he spoke. His voice wavered a little as he tried to affect his Joker tonality, “Crow. An alpha, who is in direct control of his palace, which can alter the state of reality as he sees fit in the blink of an eye, is in rut.” He looked up at Akechi then, his eyes dilated behind his domino mask, and Akechi clenched his teeth together as he continued, “How safe do you think it is to leave him here to wait it out?”Akechi narrowed his eyes down at him, still showing red behind the glass in his mask as he asked, “And what, exactly, are you proposing?” He already knew; he’d breathed in the air in the room deliberately. He already knew, but--“How long does rut last if their instincts are satisfied?”
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Persona 5 Protagonist (unrequited), Amamiya Ren/Maruki Takuto, Kurusu Akira/Maruki Takuto, Maruki Takuto/Persona 5 Protagonist, Maruki Takuto/Persona 5 Protagonist/Akechi Goro
Series: Paring Figs - P5R Omegaverse AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2131578
Comments: 8
Kudos: 45





	If I breathe you, will it kill me?

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to "Tether Yourself to Me" that takes place during Third Semester. I hope you all like it!
> 
> I fully intended to put illustrations in here but things happen, you know. I might draw some illustrations and put them in later, so keep an eye on my twitter @lyonfaced and feel free to tell me what you'd like to see illustrated most! Feels pretty good to invent a ship tag too, ngl lol
> 
> No beta editors we die like men. No one should be subjected to my shitty drafts but me.

At night the palace seemed almost impossibly large, towering high over most of the other buildings in Odaiba, shining like the structural composite of Maruki’s will for hope, surveillance, and salvation that it was. It was a wonder people weren’t standing around all hours of the day to gawk at it, though Maruki probably had something to do with that. It was physically impossible, yet the security cameras, the lenses gleaming an eerie teal and white, were completely functional and all-seeing, always watching and recording.

Akira could practically feel the gaze of the lenses outside pass over him as he stared up at the place in the cold of night. The weight that Maruki had...changed like he had, that he could manifest a palace—that he’d had a palace for months and none of them had realized it, combined with the vast amount of information they had uncovered so far, why this all happened, how he was changing cognition on the scale he was… Akira could feel the weight of it all pressing on his chest since weeks prior and hadn’t felt relief since. He might not feel relief until they take his heart. Maruki was trying to be reasonable; he hadn’t suddenly transformed into someone evil overnight. His desires were...admirable, if deeply misguided.

Akira shook his head, bringing himself out of his thoughts. He didn’t even really want to be here right now, he didn’t want to look at or be in this palace more than absolutely necessary, but something was pulling at the back of his mind that he needed to be here. A deep urge to see him had pulled his feet toward the palace again, so he stood in the cold dry air of Odaiba, each exhale of breath fogging in the air before dissipating shortly after as he stared up at this towering, egoistic pillar.

A familiar, clipped voice beckoned to him from down the street, “What are you doing here?”

He stiffened and turned towards the familiar voice, Akechi approaching from down the street in his tan trench coat, his tartan scarf tucked close to his neck and under his coat collar.

“How did you know I was here?” Akira asked, forcing his posture to relax a little bit.

He twisted his mouth, unimpressed, “I was around, and I could smell you. You’ve never really been all that subtle with your scent.”

Akira regarded him a moment behind his glasses. ‘Around’ wasn’t much of an answer, and his pheromones weren’t _that_ strong, were they? Then again, Akechi being an alpha would be more sensitive to that sort of thing. They’d spent plenty of time together before the end of November, after all.

Akechi continued at Akira’s lack of a response, very used to being the one to carry most of their conversations, “So, why are you out here by yourself?” His eyes darkened as he continued, “Don’t tell me you’re reconsidering his offer.”

Akira’s brow flattened over the top of his eyes as he answered, “No.”

“Then,” he continued, softening his tone back toward condescending, “I reiterate my question.”

Akira turned to look up at the palace again, blinking at the cold wind that blew shortly down the street. “...just thinking.” _“I had a feeling I should come,”_ would likely not be well met if he voiced it.

The wind briefly picked up and brought with it Akechi’s pheromones. He always thought he smelled like daikon.

Even if being…rivals with Akechi had felt good, or however he should classify the weird relationship they had, and even if he was able to avoid the bullet Akechi wholly intended to slam through his skull, he’d never been able to shake that look of twisted, forced satisfaction on his face when he watched Akechi attempt his long-planned assassination. The daikon scent in the underground detention room that day had been oppressive and hard, edged with a peppery spice that went straight into his nose and tried to strangle the air from his throat. With some amusement, only afforded to him now by distance from the event, he figured the dichotomous scent suited him.

Akechi’s impatient sigh made Akira shift on his feet and turn his dark eyes back to Akechi, who was adjusting one of his winter gloves. He decided to elaborate on his answer, give him a bit more substance. “I was thinking about the videotapes, the...garden. He doesn’t feel like the same person that I knew before.”

That earned him a huff, Akechi shaking his head slightly to get the hair from his face once the short gust of wind died down. “Somehow I’m not surprised that you’re thinking of such useless nonsense,” he said, reaching up with one hand to push away some strands that were hanging on to his cheek.

Akira frowned back at him, so Akechi continued, “However, your sentimentality does not actually answer my first question. Is there a reason you’re avoiding it?”

Crap. “I said I was just--”

“If you’re just pondering the eccentricities of your former _councilor_ ,” he said with some measure of disdainful emphasis, and Akira wasn’t entirely sure if that was a dig at Maruki being his previous heatmate or a dig at his counseling technique, “I wonder why it is you’re doing it here rather than back in Yongen-Jaya.”

He hadn’t intended on telling Akechi anything at all about his estrous cycle, but when they played the final vhs tape the last time they were in the palace, it had shown a mostly silent, fly-on-the-wall view of Maruki in his apartment, staring at the disheveled nest Akira recognized as the one he had made in haste one night in late November. A nest that they had similarly ruined not long after. It was an entirely unplanned thing, his heat striking when Maruki was trying to temporarily shelter him. The video continued as Maruki looked at the nest and, after a little while of hesitation, he started to tear it down. The sight of it had struck at something deep and innate in Akira and he’d released distress hormones on accident before he could clamp them down. He’d outed himself, and Ann asking the obvious question about whether the nest was his or not after the tape ended hadn’t helped matters either. Akechi hadn’t taken well to the lapse of knowledge, and while the influence an unbonded alpha could have over an unbonded omega was nothing like a bonded pair, Akira understood that there was a latent familiarity because of how recent the heat had been. Akechi didn’t like not knowing as much as possible when approaching a situation, and Akira felt similarly. Even still, it hadn't been his business.

Akira’s frown flattened again and he reached up to adjust the scarf around his neck, the scarf Maruki let him keep after he sheltered him after the interrogation. The interrogation that the man he was currently talking to tried to kill him during.

“I want to talk to him," he finally admitted.

Akechi canted his head, looking something between suspicious and confused with what he could possibly want to do that for.

“And what good would that do you, really? He’ll just spout more sanctimonious, disingenuous bullshit like he did before. What is there to gain?”

Akira tried not to feel offense on Maruki’s behalf, especially not after what he’d done to the city, the people in it, and what his plans for everything seemed to be. And yet, the indignation against Akechi flared up anyway, and it embarrassed him a little bit. Why was his first instinct to _defend_ Maruki?

Apparently his face was easy to read and Akechi scoffed at him, “Please. Do you really think he wouldn’t lie to you to get his way?”

“No,” he answered and briskly shook his head, feeling confident this time. “If he was going to be underhanded, he wouldn’t have even given us the choice in the first place.”

The former detective slid his hands into his pockets, fixing the leader of the Phantom Thieves with a hard look. “Perhaps his plan is to wear you down with your exposure to your friend’s happiness, with the psychological trials and tests in his palace, and the emotional manipulation of seeing his past and reminding you of your heat rather than presenting a good-faith attempt at helping you make an ‘informed decision.’ Had that crossed your mind at all?”

Akira shifted his jaw. Of course he’d thought of that. He didn’t believe it, but he’d considered it. Despite Maruki talking to him openly about Rumi, it was clear the man liked to keep his vulnerabilities and weaknesses, or what he considered to be those things, close to his chest. Palaces revealed those things on their own by virtue of being a product of a single person’s mind, and the idea that Maruki had not only known how to create those tapes, but deliberately left them around to be found, or decorated the garden with statues of Rumi on purpose... No, that didn’t fit at all.

Reading his shift in expression as the response it was meant to be, Akechi continued, “Well, at least you still have your good sense.”

Out of the corner of his eye, or maybe it was a reflection in his lenses, Akira noticed a flicker or…a sharp movement in the palace’s direction. He snapped his gaze back to it and a tension pressed down over his shoulders and in his stomach, like the atmosphere itself had shifted in and around them. Akira opened his mouth and took a breath, the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end as he looked back at that towering building, his eyes darting all over to see if anything had changed. Everything seemed to be the same…but we were talking about a man who could alter cognition on a whim, conceivably. Just his eyes, even just his senses, weren’t necessarily good enough for him to know whether or not something had happened, and that growing pit in his stomach only shivered at the reminder.

He had an overwhelming urge to run, a deep instinctual need to turn and make tracks as fast as he could that clashed against the pull that brought him here. Was the palace on high alert? There was no oppressive red shine to the place, he realized. Not to mention, even when the Phantom Thieves previously infiltrated to steal treasure after intentionally putting the palace holder on edge, it never felt like this.

“Well…” Akechi started, his voice strained, and Akira looked back to surmise him. He looked tense too, turned toward the shimmering palace with a wrinkled nose and a grimace. “What do you suppose that could be?”

“I don’t know if this is related to the metaverse or not,” he muttered in answer, “It feels...weird. I don’t remember something like this from any other palace before.”

Akechi hummed, turning to glance at Akira. His rufous colored eyes bore into his grey ones, his gaze shifting minutely as he looked for something in his face. The tension around his eyes lessened after a breathless few moments before he said, with caution, “Do you still want to go inside? If you do, I’m not letting you go in alone.”

He hesitated. The oppressive pressure in the air had waned just a bit, but the shift was still there, and a stupid part of his brain was less worried that they might be walking head long into danger beyond their abilities to handle and more so as to whether _Maruki_ may be in trouble. He chastised himself. Worried for a man with an unfathomable reach of power… Then again, the metaverse had so much unknown potential to it, or it seemed to. There was no telling what was going on inside. Maruki wasn’t all-powerful, not yet.

He also acknowledged the fact that he hadn’t particularly wanted to talk to Maruki in front of anyone else this time, but...

Akira swallowed and nodded.

“Yeah.”

Akechi pressed his mouth into a light frown, glancing at the palace again. He let out a sigh then, the line of his shoulders sharpening as he took his phone out of his pocket. “Alright, but I won’t stick around if everything goes sideways, you understand?”

Akira nodded, knowing full well that he was lying, and watched as Akechi tapped the application for the MetaNav and opened the history to go inside.

The palace was much clearer when they entered the metaverse, but it was only once they stepped off the elevator and into the steril, white lobby that the air really started to feel worse.

Akechi all but coughed as the doors closed behind them. “Agh—ugh, this smell…!”

Akira dimly realized as his lungs filled with a burning smell that the lobby was empty, followed immediately by the realization that his body was shuddering. Goosebumps were spreading all over his skin in the wake of small, constant shivers, and he looked at Akechi. He was gripping at his mask when he looked and immediately let go.

“Are you--?”

Akechi shook his head as if throwing away an errant train of thought, “Well...this is new.”

“What?”

“No shadows, and yet…” Akechi muttered, the angry tone lacing into his typical speaking voice, “I feel a very overwhelming urge to slaughter something.”

Well, that was the _opposite_ of Akira’s feelings right now, but his feelings were weird: A strong fear that somehow tried to weave neatly with a need to go further into the palace, a drive to search for something specific. Maybe this was like the adrenaline spike when you’re about to do something dangerous on purpose, like skydiving. He swallowed the saliva collecting in his mouth and took another breath, a taste like smoke and fire on his tongue. It felt...weirdly familiar.

“Can a palace be on fire?” he asked, walking further into the foyer and toward the elevator, their footsteps echoing in the empty room.

“You saw Okumura’s palace explode, didn’t you?” Akechi replied blithely as they made their way quickly up the stairs and turned to the inner waiting room.

Akira shook his head, “Okumura and Shido’s palaces fell apart, but neither of them caught fire. Besides, this building sort of exists in reality, doesn’t it? It smells like something’s burning.”

They left the inner waiting room, eerie with no shadows or people inside, and rounded into a hallway as Akechi replied, “There’s no smoke. I’m not sure what you’re smelling, but I don’t smell fire at all.”

That put a pause in his step, but Akira continued regardless, driven by that unknown need, his feet moving on their own as he parsed what he was just told. “Then…what does it smell like?” he asked.

The answer was drenched in disgust and that shiver of a laugh that seemed to be perched on the back of Akechi’s tongue, “A wounded animal.”

A shudder ran up Akira’s spine and he picked up his pace as a phantom wisp of spicy daikon reached his nose. The combination of smells was only making him more anxious.

The further they went into the palace, the more clear it became that it was completely and utterly empty. Even the birds that typically settled around the open foyer and the other areas with open skylights were nowhere to be found. As they took a door into another hallway, Akira slowed to a stop as they stood in front of the tree at the center of a circular room, the downstairs floor of which typically had people, or cognitions of people, milling from the entrance to the testing prep areas. But now, there was no one. As unsettling as the palace already was, with it's cult-like banners and tests, somehow removing the beings that inhabited it made it feel like an abandoned, uncomfortable liminal space.

Akechi’s voice was clipped, “Why are we here? Do you even know where you’re going?”

Akira stared at the tree through his mask, feeling a pull again, like a line reeling in a fish, and walked down toward another door, took it, and stopped as they entered the hallway. Akira took a deep breath. The smell was thicker, the fire was closer. A prickling feeling needled in the back of his brain.

“Joker--” Akechi started, but a loud bang stopped whatever exasperated statement he was going to hurl at him.

The two man team both turned their heads toward one door in particular, two doors down the curved hallway across the way.

Akira’d already started moving, Akechi’s sharp protest glancing off of him as he turned the door handle and all but shoved himself through the door. The prickling was harsher, little needles pressing into his brain. The source was in here, whatever he was looking for, he’d found it!

He reflexively took another breath as he looked toward one end of the room in a sweep, and the shiver the smell created visibly racked through his shoulders and down his spine. He swallowed around nothing and tried to calm his breathing, only for Akechi to grab him harshly on his arm. He pulled but to no avail.

“Joker!” he shouted, pulling him back towards the door. “We need to _leave!_ ”

Akira resisted him, pulling his arm out of his grasp this time. He turned back to him, irritated and protested, “No! I--!”

Akechi grimaced behind the jagged teeth of his black helmet, pulling his eyes from behind Akira to meet his. “You moron! This is--!”

The air displaced near Akechi’s arm, enough to move the shredded tatters of his sleeves. It drew Akira’s gaze just before black long shapes shot out from the wall and the ceiling, coiling sharp and dense around Akechi. A sheen passed over the shapes, blue lines like veins or circuits lighting up underneath as they lifted Akechi off the ground.

Akira was dumbfounded, belatedly reaching for him when his arms are already bound. “Crow!”

“Fuck!” he bellowed, getting an arm free and reaching for Akira as they swiped to grab a hold of one another, but he just missed him. Akechi is pulled sharply aloft and pinned to the ceiling near the corner of the room, the mass like a coil of black snakes wiggling and slithering around him. He growled and cursed, slamming his fist against one of the cords around him, and Akira finally realized what they were. He’d seen those before, in the storage room, in the security room, in mementos...

He breathed again, the smoke and fire rolling around in his lungs like flames spinning in a cyclone. It made his head foggy and he blinked a few times, his vision blurring a little bit at the edges.

“Shit, Joker! Get OUT of here!”

Akira lifted his head toward Akechi who was turning his face away and back down to the cables, hitting and scratching at them to get them off of him only for them to continue to slowly engulf him. The sound his gauntlets made against the outside of the appendages or whatever they were was…weird. It set his teeth on edge.

“No!” he yelled back, shifting to turn his head to look out into the rest of the room. “You’re…!” he started, the rest of what he was going to say dying on his lips as he finally saw him.

Maruki, dressed in his white palace clothes, was bracing himself on one knee on the floor, his other hand to his chest. His glasses had dropped to the floor and were an arm’s length away. The furniture in the room was...unstable, the edges of some of them bleeding and aberrating before sharply pulling back into the correct shape. The filing cabinets and metal chairs would lose their luster before regaining it again, and the surprise Akira felt was starting to bleed into fear when he noticed Maruki take a breath and look up at him. His hair was a little disheveled and he was flushed, looking to be struggling or in pain. He squinted at Akira and tried to push himself up by anchoring his weight on a nearby table, which suddenly stopped changing shape as he touched it. His expression was tight and, Akira realized, something was wrong with it. It wasn’t the normal expression someone would make in pain or under strain, it was...

Maruki opened his mouth like he was trying to say something before he gripped the edge of the table and shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut.

“Joke—agh!”

Akira tore his eyes away to look back at Akechi who was trying to pull out his sword to no avail. He made eye contact with him and growled at him, not the normal way Akechi growled when he was upset, but one from an alpha, “He’s in rut, you _idiot!_ GET. OUT.”

The tones in his throat snapped Akira to attention, and a quiet silence settled over his mind for just a brief moment as one of his feet shifted back toward the door. He realized what that smell was then, when he could finally think straight for a second. The hot blaze of smokey, wet fire. He’d smelled something similar throughout his heat. It was _Maruki_.

Then why had the palace grabbed Akechi and not--?

A cold unsettling realization dawned on Akira as he squeezed his hands into fists, not noticing Maruki get to his feet as one of the fluorescent lights buzzed loud and flickered on the other side of the room.

Were all those cables they saw...throughout mementos and the palace...were they Maruki’s _persona_?? He shook his head. Even if they weren’t, the palace was his cognition, so Maruki could possibly control them either way...right? Or at the very least...they’d respond to his subconscious... And Akechi was an alpha...and...so…

He squinted and shook his head again. Thinking hadn’t been great in the palace before but in this room was so much more difficult. Earlier he’d just been led by Maruki’s pheromones based only on his instincts, he hadn’t even really _had_ to think, so he didn’t. Now that he was trying--

“Fine! I’ll just do this with you here,” Akechi growled, the alpha tenor in his vocalization continued and Akira twitched, pulling him a bit out of his stupor as he looked at Akechi again. He could barely see him through the cables as they tried to restrain him and he couldn’t reach his mask or his weapons, but he didn’t need to.

“LOKI!”

In a flash of blue and white fire his persona appeared outside the mass restraining him, the red braids whipping around behind it as both of them faced down at Maruki. Akira looked to the palace owner and his body stiffened when his eyes met his. He was acting like he hadn’t even heard them, his eyes were trained directly on Akira, his pupils wide as he looked back at him. His expression was alert but felt almost alien plastered across his face. It was an expression for something closer to an animal than to a human, a predatory animal. Akira could tell better now that he’d been struggling for a while, too. His outfit was rumpled and his collar unbuttoned, his skin flushed all the way down to the top of his chest, and his breathing was heavy. There was a bend to his brow, a crease in the middle, one of the few things that still indicated that the man underneath hadn’t been entirely lost to whatever alpha instincts were firing inside him.

The phantom thief suddenly realized, under that sharp gaze, that he had no idea what to do in this situation _besides_ run. It was the only thing he had been taught as an omega to do when they went over rut in health class years ago.

So why didn’t his legs want to cooperate?

“Pay attention!” Akechi demanded, and despite the demand being meant for Maruki, the added tones made Akira’s head snap to attention. “Loki! Laevateinn!!”

The shining crimson sword hovering around Loki’s striped body flipped to direct at Maruki and started to spin.

Maruki gritted his teeth and finally turned away from Akira, glaring at Akechi with a ferocity that felt so completely uncharacteristic of him that Akira thought he was hallucinating for a second. The arch of Maruki’s frown was severe and he gripped his hands into shaking fists as he glared at Akechi. He clicked his teeth at Akechi’s threat.

Loki’s sword rose into the air and readied its down slash, and for a split second, Akira nearly ran toward the both of them, but it wasn’t necessary. More black cords shot up suddenly from the floor and took the blow for Maruki, some of them immediately falling limp and disintegrating while others remained firm in their protection. The flickering of some of the bulbs finally blinked with a loud _pop,_ and it made Akira jump at the sound. The other half of the room drastically dimmed in its wake.

Akira finally managed to take a full step towards the exit door, his heart racing. The smells of fire and spicy root were making his head spin, and even though Akechi’s smell wasn’t as powerful as Maruki’s rut scent, it brought some sense of control back to his brain, if an urgent, omegean fear could be considered “control.” He needed to get out, but, he didn’t want to leave Akechi. He...he didn’t want to leave Maruki to suffer, either, but…

His spine stiffened as Maruki turned back to him and started walking toward him, his pupils bigger again the second he took him under his gaze. Akira tried, and failed, to pull his eyes away from him, especially when he realized that he was hard. _Of_ course, he thought, _he’s in rut_. He’d probably been hard the entire time.

The memory of that cock stretching him open back in November flashed across his mind and his breath hitched.

_It could do that again. If he didn’t run._

It was suddenly a little hard to swallow...and a little hard to remember he needed to...to...

“Get away from him!!” Akechi bellowed, “Loki!”

Another spin and a sharp red flash of Loki’s sword came down, but a mass once again came up to protect its master. Two of the cables reached out to grab the sword as it slew them, and Akira realized some of them had hands. Hands with long, pointed, glowing claws. They were more like tentacles or arms rather than cables.

Maruki was right up in his space now, looking down at him, and he could feel the pressure on his own instincts, particularly to bare his neck to him. To tilt his chin up and turn his head, let the gland on his neck be laid bare. To surrender. He fought it, instead looking back into his eyes, staying firm. The weird lighting in the room caught in the mirrors in Maruki’s pupils, and he realized that his features had softened again. He was strained, but there wasn’t malice there. There was something trying to keep his need to breed or fight at bay. Maruki was definitely still in there.

Akira’s mouth thinned, but he opened it again when he remembered he needed to avoid breathing through his nose. He remembered what Maruki had told him when he’d asked about what ruts were like back in November, if they were like heats. The most important points were that they started from acute stress with no way to relieve it, and that ruts warped negative emotions and funneled them into primal urges. Maruki was on the precipice of becoming a demigod, if not an actual god, with the self-imposed responsibility of making everyone happy according to his own moral code and the greater good.

Honestly, this should be the least surprising turn of events.

“Joker!!”

Akira took a breath and blinked, looking over Maruki’s shoulder at Akechi, before realizing that Maruki was reaching for him and stiffened his right side.

Akechi’s shout continued, “Eigaon!!”

Akira clenched his teeth and stopped himself from reflexively reaching for his mask. Alice flickered beside him, and it caught Maruki’s gaze as he looked down at the persona he’d equipped, stopping what he was doing. Once again, though, the arms came up from the ground and blocked the mass of black and red magic that hurdled toward the two of them, breaking it apart on impact. He didn’t even seem to react this time, the arms just moved on their own. Maruki’s eyes flashed at a delay and he squeezed his eyes shut, putting his hand over his nose and mouth.

Struggling for a moment on what to do, Akira swallowed, successfully this time, and murmured, “Maruki…?”

Maruki took a breath between his teeth and looked at him with agonizing eyes, teetering on the edge of lucidity, and, with his free hand, grabbed the door handle behind Akira and shoved it open. Akira blinked as Maruki pressed his hand to his chest and pushed him through the door before slamming it closed in front of him.

He caught his balance against the opposite wall after stumbling over his feet and blinked again, taking a deep, cleaner breath through his mouth now that he was in the hallway. He’d...pushed him away? His chest hurt with a pang.

_Alpha…?_

Akira hissed at his subconscious feelings of rejection. A noise that sounded like a howl from the other side of the door startled him and pulled him from his thoughts. An lonely, grievous noise, and he only just managed to stop himself from grabbing the door handle and wrenching it open. No, Maruki had wanted him there but he’d forced him out here to save him. They all knew what would happen if he stayed there. They _knew_!

And yet, when Akira pulled his hand away from the door knob, he was shaking, and still, his feet wouldn’t move.

Akechi watched with mild surprise when Maruki shut Akira out of the room despite knowing, very well, what his body and his brain were telling him right now. What they had been screaming at him for, at this point, considering the strength of his stench in the air and his physical state, more than a few hours. It was strong enough that it was making what tenuous grasp Akechi had on withholding his desire to just kill Maruki and be done with all this bullshit that much more difficult to hold back, something he was really only doing for Akira’s sake in the first place.

Maruki gripped at his hair as he forced himself away from the door before falling back on to his knees, letting out a guttural, horrible howl, an alpha signaling severe distress. Akechi saw red and let out a shuddering breath to dissipate the urge to answer in threat, letting the wrinkle in the back of his mouth go instead of barking back at him. He released the immediate tension in his arm as it gripped hard enough into one of the tentacles close to him hard enough to hurt himself. It’s a good thing Akira didn’t slam back through that fucking door!

“Well, I was about to congratulate you for getting him out of here,” he said, his tone dripping with malice and contempt, his lower alpha register now something he probably couldn’t stop even if he wanted to, which he didn’t. “I was going to say it was good that you hadn’t been reduced to an animal. But, it looks like my compliment would have been empty. You really are the trembling, feral animal you reek of.”

Loki leaned back in his seated position as he floated in place, and Akechi shifted his body to a less uncomfortable position so he can better see his target.

Maruki snarled from the ground and looked up at him, and Akechi didn’t get the chance to do or say anything more before the black mass coiled around him tightened, and his neck hitched to the side. He huffed and barked with rage, wrenching his posture, his shoulders, and his arms around to try and give himself more room. The coil did give in a weird, soft way, like the appendages themselves had a hardness to them, but there were layers, and he couldn’t really figure out what the hell these things were even supposed to be made of, let alone how to break them.

Luckily, Akechi didn’t have to vocalize what he wanted, so Loki turned and blasted the coil around him with eigaon. Some of the arms fell away but were swiftly replaced. He did it again, and once more to no real avail, and Akechi hissed as he realized it wasn’t doing much good. The tentacles were being replaced nearly as quickly as they were being destroyed, and if he started using other moves, he’d wither down his own health, which already wasn’t doing very well. Joker was the one that kept the healing items.

Maruki didn’t say anything as he forced himself back up to stand, his jaw tight as he growled up and snapped at him.

“Ahh!” Akechi complained, “Fuck!” He shoved a tentacle out of the way and growled down at Maruki in answer, who met his gaze and showed his teeth. Fuck this _fuck this_. If Maruki wanted to fight he’d give him a _fight_. Territorial, sanctimonious, _prick_!

“Loki…!” he snarled, reaching to grab at his weapons again, just barely managing to touch the grip of his gun. “Shit!” he hissed, pushing harder against the resistance around his hips to try and get to it.

Maruki whipped his head around back toward the door just in time for it to swing open, the last, stubborn, stupid idiot that needed to be there walking straight through the doorway. Akechi’s roiling blood stopped for a moment as he froze in shock, watching Joker kick the door closed behind him.

The other alpha’s posture relaxed when he recognized Joker, his face softening from threatening to pensive, but then immediately coiled again into something like pain.

“Joker,” Akechi warned, trying to cool down his temper, “I don’t know what you think you’re--”

Joker took a deep breath through his nose, which alarmed Akechi and seemed to do something else to Maruki, who covered his own nose on reflex and started to tremble, but before Akechi could chastise him, he spoke. His voice wavered a little as he tried to affect his Joker tonality, “Crow. An alpha, who is in direct control of his palace, which can alter the state of reality as he sees fit in the blink of an eye, is in rut.” He looked up at Akechi then, his eyes dilated behind his domino mask, and Akechi clenched his teeth together as he continued, “How safe do you think it is to leave him here to wait it out?”

Akechi narrowed his eyes down at him, still showing red behind the glass in his mask as he asked, “And what, exactly, are you proposing?” He already knew; he’d breathed in the air in the room deliberately. He already knew, but--

“How long does rut last if their instincts are satisfied?” he asked, as straight faced as he possibly could, but the wince of embarrassment was there.

Akechi wrinkled his nose and shook his head. He glanced down at Maruki, whose eyes hadn’t left Akira since he walked inside, and he’d crouched down to the floor, probably in an attempt to keep himself from going over to him. He wasn’t even in a state to speak, that much was clear, since the man who normally couldn’t seem to ever stop talking hadn’t said a word the entire time they’d been here. It was an equally valid assertion that the likelihood that he could understand them speaking was also quickly leaving him, if it hadn’t left already. All he’d soon be able to understand were pheromones, body language, and maybe names.

“How should I know,” he spat, dismissive, turning his eyes back to the leader of the Phantom Thieves.

Akira sighed, looking like he expected that answer, “You sure?”

Akechi looked hard back down at Akira. He’d always imagined that killing someone would likely serve a similar function to sex in terms of curbing ruts, and though it was a largely historical phenomenon, precipitated through tales of war and revenge, it was still certainly an idea people recognized. Few, of course, in modern times, had the opportunity to test out something so debasing as killing another person to make their inner animal calm. As stupid as he was when he started his role working with Shido, he’d taken advantage of some of his early assignments when he realized he was going through rut to see what it felt like. To his chagrin, it hadn’t really felt any more thrilling than it already did, though it did seem to abate his rut to some extent as far as he could tell. As for sex...

“Yeah,” Akechi affirmed darkly, “Are _you_ sure you’re not just trying to find an excuse? We could work, for instance, together to hit enough of these to get me out and we can fight him.”

Akira shrugged off his coat and with how Maruki lurched forward, it was a miracle that he kept himself in place. Akechi ground his teeth as he watched him cast his coat to the side, his arms fully exposed now. Akira looked up at him and frowned, knowing fully what he meant and no appreciating it at all. “And expect him not to snap while we wait, or for me to not have to carry you out if I hit you too much?” He pressed under the bottom of his mask with his fingers, like a pair of glasses, and pushed it up to rest on top of his head. “This is the only guaranteed way.”

Akechi huffed, looking back at the winding nest of black and shimmering blue keeping him near the ceiling. After a moment or two, Loki dissipated outside of it. If that’s what Akira’s decided, he’s not going to convince him the risk was worth avoiding the consequences of his choice. Instead, he needed to focus on getting out of this thing no matter what level of effort and how long it took, provided he actually had the strength to escape when he did. And then he’d take Akira with him.

As Akira seemed to psyche himself up and start to move toward Maruki, Akechi spoke, “I don’t care if I have to pull you off of his dick, if I get out of here before you’re done, I’m taking you with me.”

Akira swallowed and glanced up at him. “Thanks,” he said before beginning to walk across the room. His answer was more clipped than actually appreciative.

Akechi wasn’t about to dispute the possibility that this was something Akira wanted, even if he’d never admit it. It made his stomach churn a little, like it had when he found out he’d slept with him in the first place.

He pressed his lips together and swallowed the unpleasant feeling in his throat before turning away from the both of them, intent on blocking out as much as possible and try to work through this tangle caging him in. Whether it was his persona or just a part of his palace, if Maruki was distracted, it could help…

Akira had been shaking, even just a little, the entire time he’d been back in the room, and especially now as he crossed over the white tile and got down on one knee in front of Maruki, whose eyes were locked onto his neck. He wasn’t about to suggest that having sex with Maruki again wasn’t something he wanted, but the circumstances were so far from ideal that he’d genuinely rather not. Being able to give in to his instincts would be nice if he could, but there was a part of him that was alert to Akechi being there, being able to look at them, so he wasn’t sure he’d be able to do that. Another Alpha in the room was just another vulnerability, a risk. Even turning his back to him made him feel unpleasant, like a string tugging on his skin to get him to turn around. It was something he only felt with Akechi sometimes, though granted, it probably didn't entirely have to do with just his dynamic.

With a trembling hand, he reached up to his high collar and Maruki’s quaking stilled, eyes precise and staring as the hand covering his mouth and nose curled into a loose fist resting against his face. He was waiting, maybe in disbelief.

Akira purred, the noise centering at the bottom of his throat, and he was a little surprised that Maruki seemed to relax a little bit. His wide eyes drew a bit heavier, the line of his clenched jaw flattened and smoothed the line of his face. Akira rarely purred, he’d never really needed to, and he’d especially never done it for an alpha. Seeing him relax was reassuring… He could do this. He pinched the clasps at his collar open, one, two, three… He wedged two of his fingers under the cloth, intent to work the clasp near his clavicle.

Before he could work it open, or blink, Maruki was on him, and he was horizontal against the white laminate tile. He was lucky the air didn’t get knocked out of him and immediately there was wet, searing heat against his revealed gland and he gasped, yielding and baring his neck to give Maruki’s mouth better access. Maruki licked and sucked at his skin, whimpering in relief as his hand wedged over Akira’s to try and force the rest of his shirt open. Even through gloves Akira’s skin was sensitive to foreign touch, having spent too much time with his brain being coated and re-coated by alpha pheromones, and he arched into and then away from his probing fingers and mouth. Maruki’s lips were _burning._ Akira let out a shaky breath as he tried to grab a hold of his thoughts, the steps he’d tried to haphazardly plan when he was in the hallway, before they could scatter like balloons in an air current.

“Maruki...hey…” he tried, his voice cracking as he caught the man’s wrist before he ripped the hinges in his shirt vest. He swallowed and used his sweeter, omega register, “Alpha…”

That got Maruki’s attention, and he reluctantly pulled away to look down at him, whining a little bit as he met his eyes. His molten chocolate eyes were just a ring around his black pupils, his lips parted as he breathed heavily over top of him. It didn’t take two seconds before his shoulders started to shake again and Akira couldn’t help but smile a bit at him, remembering the stubborn effort he’d put in to resisting him while he was in heat because he wanted to respect him, even if it failed in the end. Even if it was going to fail this time, too.

Maruki blinked, taking a deep breath of the air between them. Akira reached up with his free hand and pressed it against Maruki’s cheek, drawing his thumb along the line of his cheekbone before Maruki turned and nosed at the edge of his glove, licking at the underside of his wrist. Akira swallowed, already feeling his groin getting hotter as he worked his shirt the rest of the way open while he was distracted, finding it difficult to pull his eyes away from Maruki’s mouth against his skin, a brief glimpse of a sharp canine, the flash of pink that peeked through his lips when he drew his tongue over his veins.

He cleared his throat and reached for the front of his pants and stopped, tilting his head to glance back at Akechi. He wasn’t looking at them, instead appearing to be trying to move around in his ‘cage.’ Even if he wasn’t looking at them...he could hear them…and he could smell them. Akira winced at the thought, and felt even worse when embarrassment wasn’t the only thing he was feeling. Maybe his omega brain was already helping him out after all...

The mouth against his wrist left and Akira turned back to look at Maruki. He was staring down at the hand he’d left hovering at the clasp to his black pants.

“Uh—!” Akira started, automatically pulling his hand away. What he didn’t expect was for Maruki to shift his knees back just enough to lean down and press his face directly between his legs.

Akira gasped and propped himself up on one elbow. “Whoa--!” he protested, but it choked off before he could say anything further as Maruki took a deep breath and pressed his mouth along the outline of his growing erection. “Hahh—shit…” Akira breathed, his face growing beet red as Maruki chirped with delight, the line of his brow relaxing as he breathed in his scent again.

God this was embarrassing...oh god… Akira couldn’t bear to turn around in Akechi’s direction. If he did and met his eyes, he’d lose his nerve for sure. It was almost like he could already feel his eyes on the back of his head…

“Alpha…” Akira tried, his whisper not nearly as controlled as it was the first time he said it, but Maruki didn’t react to him, instead following the underside of his quickly hardening cock with his nose. He mouthed at the head when he found it and Akira’s hips jerked as he whimpered. Even with the layers of clothes, he could feel the wet heat of his mouth.

For the first time that he could remember, Akira was waiting for the fog of pheromones to take him with urgency. That would make this _so_ much easier. He’d missed Maruki...his touch…feeling desired…feeling safe... Even if the circumstances were far from ideal, and not exactly safe, he’d much prefer to enjoy this and lose himself in it like he could during heat. Recalling that open layout apartment felt like remembering yesterday and ages ago all at once; the atmosphere there almost didn’t feel real anymore when he remembered it. Like it was a dream.

White gloved fingers reached up to pull off Akira’s pants. Akira pulled himself from his thoughts and assisted him in getting it undone, flattening the arch of his legs to let Maruki pull them down. What he hadn’t expected was for him to take his boxers as well and he jumped a little when the cool feeling of the floor met his naked lower half. His ears and face burned as Maruki looked at his body with desire, a low, hungry rumble vibrating in his chest as he flared his nostrils. It was completely unfiltered. He’d never looked at him like that before, at least he didn’t remember if he did. While the unfamiliarity of it was a little off-putting, the heat and lust directed toward him and how good it made him feel easily eclipsed it. An alpha seeing something they wanted…and that was him… And not just any alpha...

His pant legs hitched on his boots and Maruki frowned a little, looking at where the clothing caught with mild frustration and Akira sat up, leaning on one arm as he reached between his bent legs with the other to try and get to the shoes and pull them off. “Hang o--”

Maruki obeyed, but only for a brief moment. In leaning down and bending his legs, Akira had completely exposed his ass to him and Maruki dove for it, grabbing his hips and hefting him up and on to his knees, twisting him around in the process.

Akira cried out in surprised as he was turned unexpectedly. His chin clipped the floor before he could tuck it against his neck, his teeth clacking together. A pained breath barely managed to escape him before Maruki’s tongue was against his hole and he gasped, “Eep! Ah--!”

As Maruki started to lap at the slick coming out of him, his grip firm on both of his hips, Akira’s spine sagged a little, his arm still caught between his legs on the floor as the fuzzy warmth of arousal finally, _finally_ started to overtake his brain. His eyelids felt heavy as he tucked his chin and he hummed.

Maruki’s hands shifted and his thumbs spread him open, making it easier for him to get to every drop of natural lubricant leaking out of him. He alternated between running the tip of his tongue along the ring of muscle to coax it out and lapping it up with the flat of his tongue, and the rhythm eased the stress and tension out of Akira little by little. When he pressed his tongue inside him, Akira moaned softly, his back arching automatically to make penetration easier. Even in rut, Maruki was gentle. Sure he wasn’t as careful or considerate as when he was himself, especially when communication wasn’t an option, but he wasn’t being violent like Akira was afraid he’d be. Not like the borderline werewolvian animal that porn and movies made rutting alphas seem like. Not like...Akechi probably was...

Akira shifted his arm and bent it up near his head to push himself up on to his forearm, extricating his other arm from between his legs and sighed, watching the fog from his breath quickly disappear from the tile floor under him. Another moan escaped him as Maruki speared him with his tongue and he leaned his hips back against him, which was immediately followed by fingers wrapping around his hard length. He shivered and squeezed his eyes shut, his answering noises struggling between breaths as a result.

“Ma—ahh…!” he gasped sweetly, his back arching as he started to stroke him. As determined fingers squeezed around his shaft, down and back up, his hips jostled and it pulled another whine out of him. His concentration centered on those two points of contact, no doubt Maruki giving him a reach around was making him even wetter in the process. Hot and wet…so good...and Maruki was tugging on his cock like it was a hand pump for water and he was _dying_ of thirst.

Akira’s reduced to panting when Maruki’s tongue finally leaves him, and the rhythm on his throbbing erection eases. He’d very nearly forgotten where he was until he took a breath and a barely noticeable taste of hot spice hit the top of his throat.

 _Akechi_.

His breath stilled and, despite his better judgment, he looked up, immediately meeting piercing red eyes from across the room. Akechi’s arm was grabbing on to one of the tentacles. That and his mask covering most of his face made his expression inscrutable, but he didn’t need to know what his expression was. He was looking down at him, at _them_ , and Akira was immediately pulled out of the arousal in his head and drenched with the ice cold realization of being _observed_. The hairs on the back of his neck stood and he ducked his head, covering his face with an arms, as if it made any sense at all to do that. He put one hand down on the back of his neck, his skin burning even through the gloves he’d forgotten to take off. _No, stop! Don’t look! Please don’t look!_

The grip on his erection ceased and Akira immediately felt warmth across his back as Maruki leaned over him. Hot breath puffed behind his ear as Maruki whined against his hair, followed immediately by a low, soft purr. The sound and vibrations along his back relaxed him, and Akira let Maruki pull his hand away from his neck and mouth at where his gland was. The phantom thief let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d held, and sagged a bit under Maruki’s protective warmth, the spice that had been in the air almost completely washed out and replaced with the smell of roasted walnuts and fire. Maruki was scenting the air around them, and him in turn.

_Alpha’s here. It’s okay._

He grimaced a little. He wasn’t afraid of Akechi...not anymore… He just…

A distinct press against Akira’s pliable, wet hole sent a jolt up his spine that branched through his brain, dashing the thought he was just having. He immediately pulled an arm back and tried to feel for Maruki’s cock, realizing he still had his pants on, then blindly tried for the top of his pants.

Maruki’s purr hitched, followed by a staggered breath, then leaned away and off his neck. Akira pushed himself back up and turned to get a better view, Maruki reaching to pull the bottom of his shirt up. He could see the fastener now, so he went for it, pulling the button free and trying to wrench the zipper down. He needed to concentrate on what they were doing and why, not on the audience they happened to have. Akechi was trying to ignore them anyway.

Maruki was so hard and aroused that he could see the wet spot on his boxer briefs before he pulled them down along with his pants. Akira turned a little better to see his cock once Maruki reached down and pulled it all the way out. It was red and full, darker in contrast with the white gloved hand wrapped around it, and the cotton-blend fabric had left lines indented in his skin. How long had he been like that?

He heard a sigh and Akira drew his eyes up to Maruki's face. The apprehension that he’d seen there was long gone, his eyes glued to where Akira’s knuckles were pressed against the underside of his cock, wedged between it and the elastic band of his underwear. His brow was more relaxed now, and his chest rose and fell, his breathing a bit heavy, anticipating.

Akira swallowed as he turned his hand and wrapped his fingers around him in an awkward grip and squeezed. Maruki swallowed in response, his eyes flicking from his hand back to the ass he had been rutting against.

He could do this, Akira told himself, just...don’t… _Just think only about Maruki_.

Maruki situated properly behind him again so Akira let go, putting his hand back on the floor as the warm, blunt head pressed against him and, just as quickly, breached inside him.

It barely burned, sliding in nice and easy, and Akira’s mouth hung open as Maruki pressed all the way to the curve inside him. It felt so fast, like he blinked and he could already feel the warm skin of hips pressed up against his cheeks and Maruki’s cock filling up so much space inside him. He heard Maruki grunt behind him before he started to move, thrusting in and out of him, forcing a gasp and moan from Akira’s throat.

He didn’t remember the sex during his heat all that well, it had only happened twice, but being filled up was the most satisfying thing in the world then, a close second to being knotted. It had truly been what he’d needed. The way his body knew the difference between Maruki’s flesh and the knotting toy was so intense at the time that it almost felt otherworldly. Using the toy on himself had only felt like abaiting the pain before his body realized it had been tricked and the wave of the hollow ache returned. Maruki knotting him, scenting him, touching him was like the satisfaction of finding a missing puzzle piece, the perfect interlocking part snapping into the place exactly right. His body sang when he knotted him.

Now, sex felt good, it felt really good, even if it wasn’t the same. His insides clung on every time the cock pulled out and gobbled it back up every time it pushed back in again. He concentrated on how his body felt, tingling and warm, the tile under him having already acclimated to his body heat. Gloved hands on his hips held him fast as Maruki thrust in to him over and over and over…bottoming out and pulling out part way to do it again and again…

Akira stared unseeing down at the ground, shifting his hands back as they started to slip, his red gloves blurring and losing their shape as he stared straight passed them. He wished he could feel more of Maruki’s skin… Not just his hips… Not his gloves…

Maruki’s hands moved up to the bend of his back and the added weight and pressure forced him down onto his forearms, the snap of Maruki’s hips getting faster. Fingers pressed hard under his ribs as he held him in place and a spark shot up Akira’s spine and into his brain, like a slingshot hurling a stone, while Maruki bore down on him. He only realized then that he’d been making noises the entire time when the jolt made him hiccup. He squeezed his hands into fists, his forearms doing their best to keep him in place and upright under the assault.

“Ah! Ah! W-wai--!” he whined, the pressure building rapidly under his spine all of a sudden. Despite Maruki’s rimjob's aim to swallow up his slick, he was plenty wet, and it made the impact against him so loud that it rang in his ears. It felt like it was echoing in the room, and the awareness almost seeped back in to temper his arousal again.

Maruki shifted his hips and ran right into his cervix before the reminder could form and he yelped in pain, instinctively trying to move away but the hands gripping him held him tight. He arched his back to relieve the pressure, only to shift so Maruki could hit his g-spot.

“Ahh! Hah!!” he cried out, and Maruki thrusting over it twice was all it took to make him come. He mewled as his core tightened, his cum splattering over the tile underneath them. His legs shook as he tried to breathe, but Maruki kept pounding into him relentlessly, forcing a string of high-pitched whines and gasps to dribble out of him, his eyes rolling as the walnut scent in the air became more complex, inebriating him as it mixed with the post orgasm high that was quickly turning to over-stimulation.

_Alpha is so proud of you! You’re being such a good omega!_

He grimaced as the overwhelming urge to cry came over him and he reached back, putting his hand over the back of his neck again.

The push and pull inside him slowed and the pressure under his lungs, or maybe it was his chest, lessened, and Akira took a shaky breath, realizing he’d started drooling at some point and sucked what he could back behind his teeth. The warmth descended over his back again and Maruki chuffed against his fingers, pressing his face against them to make him move them off his neck. Akira hesitated, his fingers curling a little as he opened his eyes. Maruki had moved one arm to be higher up to brace himself and he could see his hand pressed down on the tile for purchase, right beside his own. Akira turned his free hand and curled his finger under the edge of his glove, hoping to peel it off. He just wanted...to feel his skin…

Maruki didn’t react to him trying to get his glove off and Akira pressed his fingers all the way back over his neck to try and get him to notice what he was doing. A short whine puffed into his hair, immediately followed but a soft growl, one born from frustration or...maybe a plea rather than a threat, and it pulled at Akira’s instincts to obey. He took his hand away and the growl stopped as Maruki leaned down further to kiss and lick against his neck, Akira’s back bending even more to accommodate the shift. Maruki’s hips kept moving all the time, very slow and shallow.

Akira pressed his lips together, letting out his own whine as he struggled with the glove. The pressure of the lips against his neck let up briefly and Maruki finally seemed to understand. He lifted his hand and Akira stripped him of his glove and tossed it. Maruki rid him of his glove in turn before diving back to his gland. Akira felt the scrape of teeth as Maruki’s hand took his and he moaned, shivering, and Maruki seemed to take that as a cue to pick back up where he’d been interrupted. Instead of sitting back up to be perpendicular like he had been, he bent his elbow on Akira’s other side and leaned on it. Akira slid his knees closer together to ease the pressure on his spine, lowering himself almost until his chest was against the tile and relaxing his back. Maruki turned his head to pay attention to the gland on the other side of his neck as his hips started to undulate faster. Akira squeezed around his length when he made contact with the untouched gland, and Maruki moaned against his skin in answer, sucking hard enough on his neck to leave a bruise as he fucked him.

All Akira could really feel was Maruki now, it’s like he was everywhere around him, inside him. It was hot and hard to breathe but not a single part of him wanted it to be easier, because if it was, there would be less of the body curled over top of him. There’d be no pressure of Maruki’s palm against the back of his hand. No mouth against his skin...or teeth on his neck...teeth…neck…

A mixture of fear and deep arousal washed over him and it must have reflected in his pheromones because Maruki’s teeth flashed against his sore gland as he growled, protective and hot, and the sound branched like lightning through his brain. Akira arched his back and soundlessly opened his mouth as Maruki hammered into his guts. He was pounding so deep, but it didn’t hurt like the way he’d thrust into him before. It was so good, it felt _perfect._ The throbbing cock bearing down inside him almost synced with the throbbing pulse in his own ignored erection, already full and heavy between his legs again.

“M...maru—ki…” he stammered, knowing he probably couldn’t understand him. Maruki’s rhythm hardened and the alpha moved away from his neck after a quick pass of his tongue over the swollen, worried gland to give himself better leverage. Akira whined with each thrust, the wet smack of Maruki’s hips and the hot breath against his skin was starting to send him again into that blissful headspace. The air smelled of fire and nutty wood and nothing else. A bonfire in a forest by the river. Safe. Warm. A chirp escaped him in between the hard, staccato breaths he had to take between each thrust, and he received a chirp in answer from behind him, winded from exertion, and Akira almost smiled at it. Still Maruki...still _alpha…_

He took a deep breath and turned his head down, bearing his neck as he shifted his arms to better brace himself. Maruki’s thrusts hesitated briefly before starting again and picking up to a brutal pace, grunts and gasps mixing in with Maruki’s panting. Akira yelped as his cock hit the bend inside him weird and moved his hand from Maruki’s to help change his position. Maruki whimpered, changing his hips alignment and moved his ungloved hand from the floor and put it over the back of Akira’s neck, every breath he took edged with a high-pitched sound as he leaned lower over him.

Akira’s eyes widened. Was he...was he going to knot him? Was he close?

_You’re going to make alpha come! You’ll get his knot again!_

His body hummed at the prospect. A knot. _A knot!_

The pressure on his neck had Maruki’s palm pressing against one of his sore glands and he let out a string of cries as he squeezed his eyes shut. The grip on his neck tightened in response, which only heightened the urgency of the sounds spilling out of him.

Akechi might as well have never been in the room to begin with.

Akechi.

Akechi was going to see him get knotted. Hear him come.

_Another alpha._

Akira’s heart leapt into his mouth and he opened and turned his eyes to look back at the cage of arms. It was so hard to focus, to see anything at all, or even think about seeing. Was he still there? It...was… He couldn’t tell...

Maruki huffed loud behind his ear and it pulled all of his attention back to him. His rhythm was breaking and Akira braced himself, leaning back into Maruki’s pelvis as best he could. He wanted that knot. He _needed_ that knot! Please. _Please--!_

A strangled cry followed by an exuberant howl bellowed out of Maruki as his hips snapped forward and his knot popped, swelling impossibly fast as it sealed Akira shut. The knot rubbed perfectly against his walls and Akira barely managed to inhale before his second orgasm erupted inside him. It sent spasms throughout his body as jagged, sweet sobs shook out of him, the hand on his neck stiff as weight pressed him into the floor and Maruki pitched over him, the notes in his pheromones amplifying Akira’s pleasure and elongating his orgasm. All he could see were stars, and his body felt blanched white, static stuffing up his head as he bathed in a sea of hormones and pleasure.

It felt like so long before his senses started to slowly come back to him. His racing heart beat…his tingly fingers, aching knees…warm back…

The bulbous knot locking Maruki’s length inside him.

He registered a far off thump against the tile and blinked, trying to focus his eyes as there was a hurried _clnk clnk clnk_ getting louder and closer.

Searing spice flooded his lungs and his eyes snapped open, turning his head up just in time to see Akechi’s hand leaving the mask he’d pushed out of his face, pulling his gun from his belt with his other hand. Akechi could have been breathing fire with that tempestuous expression, the swirling smell of white pepper and overwhelming ginger sending goosebumps over Akira’s body and hurting his lungs, and it clashed horribly against the afterglow he’d been steeping in.

Akira’s body was slow, even as he saw him aim the gun right over his head and at Maruki. It took his reflexes a moment to catch up, and even then, his body was locked and buried under a heavy body. He reached up and grabbed at the gun, but Akechi pulled it away from him easily, not even looking at him as he aimed it again.

“Ak—Crow! What are you—??” Akira hissed, and Maruki shifted over top of him, moving his head to look at Akechi.

“If you marked him…you pathetic _piece of shit_ …” Akechi snarled, his voice shaking with anger and disbelief, the promise of murder in his tone. His red eyes swirled with hatred as he brought his other hand up to help steady the gun, finger on the trigger.

Akira blinked, confused. He…he hadn’t bitten him, he—

Before he could correct him, Maruki pulled his hand off his neck and down to the floor and scruffed him. Akira’s breath hitched as his upper body weakened immediately and Maruki pressed him down to the tile like he’d been a moment ago. He pulled off his neck and moved to shield him with his body, planting both hands on either side of Akira as he moved his head to nearly press against the muzzle of the gun. Akechi faltered a moment.

The hand he’d had on Akira’s neck was punctured and shredded on the back, bright red blood quickly filling and overflowing the teeth marks he’d left behind.

After a moment of realization Akechi exhaled a scoff, his frame relaxing a little, and let his hand drop.

Akira turned is head to see and laid there speechless for a moment. He’d…almost marked him…? He hadn’t put his hand there, Maruki had done it himself. Did…did he…? He understood he might do that and...wanted to stop it?

As soon as the gun was holstered and disappeared, Maruki dropped his head a little but didn’t move backward. He kept his body looming over Akira, brown eyes fix on Akechi. Akira turned his head a bit more and purred up at Maruki to try and get him to ease up. Hesitantly, his eyes flicked from Akechi back down to look at Akira, his pupils going from pinpoint to blowing wider the second he looked at him and he moved a little to better see him. Akira pinched his eyebrows together and chirped, frowning at the bit of blood on Maruki’s mouth.

“Well?”

Akira turned away from him and slowly got himself up on his hands so he could talk to Akechi better, Maruki hesitantly moving back to allow him up, but hovered his face at his scruff the entire time. Akechi had taken a step back as well to make conversation easier, but he was still standing right in front of them, his arms crossed over his chest as he looked down.

The situation he was in suddenly hit Akira again and he pulled his eyes away, feeling heat on his face, and Akechi just sighed.

“Really? You’re embarrassed, _now?_ After all that?” he chided.

Akira cleared his throat, looking back up at Akechi. He opened his mouth to retort before his eyes snagged on a foreign lump he hadn’t seen before in his outfit. Bulging out at the inseam of his leg.

Akechi’s tone, dark and low, came from above his eye line, “Eyes up, Joker.”

And he obeyed, Akira’s silver eyes meeting Akechi’s red ones. Akechi was hard. He was _hard_. A feeling of excitement thrummed in the back of Akira’s mind at the prospect, not necessarily because his hind brain wanted another knot, or he wanted Akechi to fuck him particularly, but because despite his outward disgust with the situation…his body reacted on its own. Or…

Akira hummed, Maruki’s growl vibrating against his spine the entire time as it centered ever present in his chest. He smirked up at Akechi, and just the expression alone was enough to turn the other’s frown into almost a scowl.

“See something you like, Crow?” he asked, and the spice in the air shifted into something he hadn’t really noticed before. In fact, it had been different since he stomped over to them. More complex.

“Don’t start,” he growled back down at him

Akira just smirked wider.

He didn’t really like that. “You're confident for someone who was just drolling like an ingrate on the floor.”

“You can’t pull me off him,” he pointed out, ignoring his insult. His nervousness about his predicament was smothered by some mixture of renewed arousal, embarrassment, and wanting to see what other sorts of reactions he could get out of him. That had always been part of the fun of being around Akechi, especially after their duel in the metaverse. He knew he’d been wearing a social mask, just like him, but the extent of it had been impossible to ascertain until recently. “So," he continued, "are you going to leave?”

Akechi shifted from one foot to the other, glancing down at Maruki’s bloodied hand. His expression looked a little complicated as he met Akira’s eyes again. “It’s what you want," he surmised, "but no, I’m not leaving just yet.”

Akira blinked, the smirk wiped off his face.

“He was cognizant enough not to bite you this time, but something tells me you won’t leave even when his knot goes away,” he guessed, leaning over a bit to more easily see Akira past the lower part of his helmet. “Right?”

Well…he hadn’t expected that answer phrased quite like that. Akira blinked and swallowed. If Maruki’s knot went down and he didn’t immediately let him go…well…

He averted his eyes and Akechi nodded, dropping his crossed arms from over his chest and anchored one on his hip. “Predictable.”

Despite the fact that he was basically naked save one glove, his open vest, and his pants caught around the tops of his boots, with his semen and slick puddled under him on the floor, the embarrassment had pretty much abated as they spoke. Maybe it was compartmentalization. Maybe it was just because it was Akechi. If anyone can affect a straight face, it was the two of them. Akechi was the best at hiding his own discomfort unless he wanted it to be known and, well...he was hard...so what did that mean exactly? Was it just the pheromones? Akira’s curiosity was and has always been a fantastic means of distraction, if not a means of getting himself into trouble all the time. Maruki's rut scent wasn't nearly as debilitating to his thought process anymore, even if the knot in him was making his head swim. That, along with Akechi's scent blasting away a lot of his afterglow, he felt at least a tinsy bit unsatisfied.

“I’m surprised you’re not in rut,” Akira said, trying to steer the conversation away, despite Maruki’s presence.

Akechi looked down at him dubiously. “What?”

“Other omegas go into heat if they’re around another omega in heat,” Akira explained, trying really hard to stop looking at Akechi’s hard on, which had yet to visibly soften. He was really big for his frame... He snapped his gaze back up to his eyes.

Akechi threw his head back with an exasperated sound and got down on one knee, slowly with a wince, and oriented himself so it was more difficult for Akira to see his inner thigh. “Ruts don’t work like that. How do you not know something so basic?”

Akira hummed thoughtfully. Maruki’s growl hitched up louder as Akechi got closer and Akechi wrinkled his nose at him.

Akira reached up, balancing on one hand, and drew his fingers over the plane of Maruki’s cheek before moving them into his slicked back hair. Maruki’s defensive eyes didn’t leave Akechi, but his growl did ease. Akechi’s upper lip calmed down and he sighed, muttering, “Of all your stupid hair-brained schemes… Taking a knot to stop a rut… Your sentimentality drives your every decision…absolutely foolish…”

“If you were in rut, I’d do the sa—”

A warning glare stopped him from finishing his sentence, even as that glare was paired with reddening ears. “Shut up.”

Akechi’s daikon scent was a little cleaner now and Akira blinked slowly, eyes pulling back down to the erection he couldn’t see anymore. The daikon and fire actually…smelled really good together now. It didn’t really clash even when they were barking at each other earlier. Everything had just been so chaotic and his hindbrain had been overwhelmed, but…now…

A hand grabbed him by the jaw and pulled his face up, forcing him to look back at Akechi’s face. His voice was rapidly waning in patience, “Joker.”

He could feel the sharp prick of the claws of his gauntlets against his hot skin. He took a steadying breath as he met those equally sharp crimson eyes, his body trying to clench despite not having much give to do so around Maruki’s knot. Something about Akechi’s face lead him to believe that he could smell his arousal in his scent.

Maruki’s growl hitched and he snorted in warning, but Akechi ignored him.

“If you refuse to focus--”

“What will you do?”

Akechi grimaced, squeezing his fingers, upping the pain even just marginally as he stared down into Akira’s eyes. Akira tilted his chin up slightly, leveling his own piercing gaze back at him, daring him, challenging him. There was a pregnant silence, only broken by the ever present rumbling behind Akira’s ear.

“I think I’ll leave you to your bad decisions. We’ll see how far that gets you,” he finally said.

Akira’s eyes widened a little bit, mind whirring quickly to interpret his vague answer. His touch in Maruki’s hair stilled. “Then move your leg.”

Akechi’s brow pinched and his nostrils flared. “If you’re going to commit to something, do it your--” The rest of his sentence was choked off as the hand Akira was using to sooth Maruki left its perch and reached out in a flash, his palm pressing against the swollen flesh trapped under skin tight fabric.

Akira’s reward for his decision included a punishment. He did get a burst of warm gingery, earthy root, but there was a bitter, smokey tang that accompanied it. Then Maruki whined, his growl halting as he stiffened over his back.

Sharp, metal-clad fingers closed around Akira’s wrist as Akechi spoke, “Well, that was a short experiment.” He flexed to pull Akira’s hand away, but he curled his fingers and held fast, even squeezed, and the alpha hissed.

Akira turned back to Maruki who had left the space under his neck and had raised his head, looking concerned at Akira’s contact to Akechi. Akira spoke quietly, “Maruki.”

Maruki hesitated a second, but instead of responding to Akira’s call, he looked at Akechi and snapped in the direction of his fingers on Akira’s jaw.

With very clear restraint not to retaliate, Akechi withdrew his hand. “You’re not his alpha,” he muttered, indignant.

After leveling his gaze at him to make sure those hands stayed, Maruki turned to look back down at Akira. He looked confused. Well, he had seemed to recognize his name. Maybe? Just prioritized making Akechi let him go. Verbal communication was worth a shot.

“Can I?” Akira asked.

Maruki’s big brown eyes shifted slightly, reading Akira’s face, no doubt reading his pheromones at the same time. He looked back at Akira’s hand on Akechi’s bulge, then at Akira’s face, more contemplative this time. After a few seconds, Maruki winced and looked down at his injured hand. The skin around the wounds was red and painful, some of the blood in the tears having spilled out on to the floor. His jaw set as he squeezed that hand into a fist, the blood dripping out and down his hand as he broke the little coagulated tension that had begun to form.

“Maybe…can we help him?” Akira asked, the firm grip on Akechi’s leg sliding down a little in his distraction and Akechi barely managed not to outwardly shiver as he let go of his wrist, scraping one of his sharp teeth on the inside of his cheek, a place that was already sore from having to contain himself so much while he endured, _watched_ Maruki fuck Akira stupid into the tile.

Just as Akira was about to loosen his hold from Akechi entirely, Maruki grabbed his retreating elbow with his bloodied hand, startling the both of them. Wrapping his fingers around to the soft inside of his joint, Maruki forced Akira’s arm to stretch back out and held it there, tucking his head against Akira’s shoulder as blood started to trail down his arm and under his sleeve. His scent engulfed Akira’s brain for a second, a strong and sudden burst of weak fire filling his nose, his lungs, and his head.

The two phantom thieves exchanged a look after Akira cleared his head and he turned back to chirp lightly, trying to think through the pheromones. Maruki looked back at him, his throat working like he was trying to speak, or making a sound that didn’t quite make it out. Instead, he leaned forward and kissed him awkwardly, letting go of his elbow to steady himself on both hands. Akira just barely managed to kiss him back before Maruki pulled his face away and pressed his lips at the scruff of his neck again.

It occurred to Akira then that Maruki hadn’t kissed him at all this entire time until just now.

Well…that didn’t really matter right now.

That was pretty clear permission.

_Alpha says it’s okay._

Akira swallowed and looked back at Akechi, deliberately pressing his fingers into his swollen flesh and dragging his hand up toward the straining fabric closer to his groin. Then back down, and then up again. He’d gotten a little softer in the interim. He could fix that.

Akechi breathed a little through his mouth before closing his eyes and taking a breath through his nose. He shifted his hips forward, putting his other knee down as he reached up to take the rest of his headpiece off and put it to the side. It hit the tile with a clang as his light brown hair settled around his face, a little unkempt from being trapped in there while he sweated and struggled in that tangle of tentacles.

Akira turned his hand so the webbing between his thumb and pointer finger pressed along his trapped erection and Akechi huffed, opening his eyes. He swallowed and looked at Akira, meeting the gaze that hadn’t left his face.

“You’re just...doing this on a whim…” he said with an accusatory slant. When Akira just stared, continuing to rub against him, he elaborated, “Getting attention from two alphas at once... Hah, I didn’t think you—ah...would give into something so needy…”

Akira narrowed his eyes a little, Akechi’s scent a little louder now in his head. His heart rate was picking up again. “If you want me to stop…”

That earned him a scoff, Akechi's mouth turning up into a bitterly amused smirk as he pulled off his gauntlets and dropped them haphazardly beside his helmet before reaching up to the collar of his jumpsuit and quickly undoing the line of buttons on his front. The weight of the cape pins on his shoulders pulled down at his collar and took the upper part of his suit with it, which he shrugged off. He looked stronger than his lithe form implied, Akira’s eyes watching muscle move under his skin as he pulled his arms free of the belted sleeves which fell to hang heavy around his hips, and hooked his thumbs under the remaining fabric that bunched up around his hips. He looked different than he had at the public bath in Yongen-Jaya all that time ago, but how he was different Akira couldn’t really pin down. Back at the bath it had admittedly been difficult not to oggle him, but the heart-felt conversation had kept himself in check. Now, he had no reason to avoid that line of thinking.

Akira took his hand away and switched hands, the arm that had been anchoring him up this whole time starting to hurt, and when Akechi straightened his arm to push his underwear down, he shoved his gloved hand under the opening to pull his dick out.

Akechi _tsk_ ’d and grabbed his wrist again, the flesh of his hand a little calloused and warm compared cold pinching sharpness of his gloves. His voice rumbled thanks to his alpha register returning as he chided him, “You want to choke on my cock so badly that you forgot how to be decent?”

The offending omega shivered and swallowed the spit collecting in his mouth. He pulled his eyes back up to Akechi, who moved his hand out of the hot interior of his clothes. “When have I ever pretended to be decent with you?” he asked, retrieving his hand and putting it back down on the floor to better hold himself aloft.

That got him a short scoff of a laugh, which made him smile a bit. Akechi shifted his knees to be a little closer before he shimmied his boxer briefs down and pulled his cock out. He wasn’t completely hard, but it was still flushed red and hot. Akira took a breath, unconsciously licking his lips as he looked at it.

His gaze was completely locked on the erection just centimeters away and Akechi pumped it languidly. “So, if his knot goes down before we’re done. What do you want to do?”

Akira blinked, the question registering after it elbowed its way to his attention passed all the horny ideas collecting in his purview. What _did_ he want to do?

“Will…this make it go down faster?” he asked, furrowing his eyebrows. Actually, shouldn’t his knot be almost done? “Actually, how long has it been already?”

“He’s in rut,” Akechi said, stopping his hand, “And I’m here. It’s going to last a while longer.”

Huh. So, an alpha’s knot will last longer in the presence of another alpha while they’re in rut? It made sense, it ups the chance the omega won’t conceive another alpha’s child.

“Besides,” Akechi’s voice cut in, and Akira tuned back in from his thoughts, “if you keep smelling like you did before, I might still have to pull you off of him. Either way, there’s still a chance it’ll go down besides, and I need to know what you want to do if it does.”

Akira flushed at the compliment despite Akechi's matter-of-fact, light tone, and cleared his throat. It wasn’t exactly rare for Akechi to point out positive things about him, but for him to say something positive outside of his fighting ability or complimenting his perceptions was significantly less common to hear.

Or he was interpreting a statement of fact as a compliment.

Akechi moved up on his knees a little and Akira blinked, almost forgetting to answer as the cock in front of him bobbed. The prospect of tasting his skin was eating at his ability to think coherently.

“Just come down my throat,” he answered, and felt a spark of arousal when Akechi’s jaw shifted and he took a deep breath through his nose.

“Then open up,” he breathed out.

Akira did, licking his lips again and opening his mouth, his tongue slipping out just a little over his lower lip. Akechi let out a breath and shifted forward, putting his free hand on Akira’s shoulder as he lined himself up.

The smooth, round head pressed down against his tongue and slid into his mouth, a little salty with precum and sweat. Akira's lips wrapped tightly around him as he took a deep breath and bobbed his head down his length, enjoying the lingering taste of his skin, his scent growing stronger the further down he went towards its source. A shudder ran through Akechi’s body as Akira sucked back towards the tip and rolled his tongue around the head before pressing back down. He bit off a curse, his grip on Akira’s shoulder tightening a moment before easing up again.

Despite Akira’s lack of experience, his enthusiasm well made up for his halting fear that his mouth might not be big enough, or that he might get tired, or that his teeth might nick against his foreskin. As long as he could smell the gingery daikon mixed in Akechi’s scent, that’s all that mattered, it was all the encouragement he needed to keep going. He tried to relax his jaw and move down little by little, sucking back up and making sure he decended further than the last time, his limbs and his head starting to feel hot with fuzz and arousal again. Eventually, the tip hit the back of his throat as he pressed his tongue along the bottom of the hulking shaft in his mouth. His throat tightened and he pulled back on reflex, squeezing his eyes shut as he tried to surpress a cough with not success.

The fingers holding on to his shoulder moved to thread through his hair on the top of his head, almost soothing. “You can take the whole thing,” Akechi reassured from above him, unseen, “just relax.”

Akira tried to swallow the saliva in his mouth, but the angle he was in made it hard to look up at Akechi, and when Maruki moved his lips from his scruff to higher up his neck, his nose moving into his hairline, he was suddenly struck with how weird this was.

Even still, all his body knew was to clench around Maruki again as he pressed back down around Akechi, and he heard Maruki inhale as he did, his breath pressing into his hair. Despite the knot, if he clenched deep enough, he could tighten around some of him, and smelling a little more of that fire after he did was deeply satisfying.

He did as Akechi told him, relaxing his throat as he sank back down, taking the head down and into his throat this time, and Akechi groaned, his fingers tightening a little in his hair. The pit of Akira’s chest felt hot as he continued, bobbing up and down on his rapidly hardening cock until it was so stiff it could barely take the bend from this mouth to his throat proper. He whined, partially out of arousal and partially out of frustration, and the fingers in his hair twitched and shifted.

Akechi’s breathing was labored now as Akira reached up and squeezed Akechi’s hips, shifting him to pull his hips forward and then back. Akechi’s breath hitched as he swallowed. Holy shit he wanted him to fuck his throat _Joker_ wanted him to face fuck him.

“Alright,” he managed, his voice gravely.

Dimly, Akira lamented that Maruki was knotted inside him. The feeling of two alphas fucking him at once from opposite ends… His core clenched as he pressed his tongue along the underside of Akechi’s shaft again as Akechi took over, slowly taking the reigns and moving his hips. Akira took his hand away from his hip and steadied himself as Akechi carefully started to thrust inside his mouth. The intrusion was still uncomfortable, but with every breach into his throat came an increasing since of ease, and the heat coiling in the pit of his stomach continued to simmer even higher.

Above him Akechi’s breathing was getting more and more labored as his body’s urgency for pleasure started to overtake his patience and care in making sure Akira was okay. Akira had been mostly quiet when he was moving on his own, but when Akechi had control his suction was less precise, and the wet noises mixing with his little whines was absolutely obscene. He clearly liked being taken more than he liked being in control, and god if that didn't make Akechi even harder.

Maruki jerked a little, his eyes closing tightly and it drew Akechi’s gaze from the curly black head of hair at his groin to the man just behind it. Akira groaned around him, managing to flick his tongue around his head before he thrust back in and Akechi moaned in answer. Not long after, Maruki took another breath and leaned to one side, gingerly taking Akira’s hip with his wounded hand as he kept his face hovering at the back of Akira’s head, ducking it down so it was almost impossible to see his face.

“Are you squeezing his knot?” Akechi asked, almost chuckling at the prospect. “Milking the alpha behind you while you take one in your mouth… You’re unbelievable,” he added, and he wasn’t sure anymore if he was actually turned on by it or just taking another opportunity to dig at Akira. Maybe it was both. Akira’s answering moan vibrated around his cock and he shivered, biting off any possible follow-up he might have had as his head was filled with the scent of figs and cinnamon.

As strong and sweet as Akira’s scent was, it couldn’t completely drown out Maruki’s rut scent. It was calmer than before, not nearly as desperate, but the irritating notes of possessiveness and territoriality were still there. Even if it smelled like fire or smoke or whatever Akira had described before, all Akechi’s brain processed the scent as was as a stimulant, a signal of an enemy. It made his brain spark and his blood simmer under his skin, and knowing that he was taking the attention of the omega that enemy was attached to... It was exhilarating.

A shudder ran through Maruki’s stiff shoulders and his back straightened a little, his shoulders pulling the fabric of the jacket he was still wearing taught over his back as he dropped his hand from Akira’s hip. Akechi pressed his fingers a little deeper into Akira’s curls before lifting his hand and reaching for Maruki’s wavy hair, pulled back and fixed in place with a sturdy product that was losing efficacy the more he perspired. The moment his fingers touched his scalp, the other alpha jerked his head up, glaring up at him as he pressed his lips together tight, probably trying not to bare his teeth. The conflict in his eyes was clear, but even still, his face and ears were flushed red, probably from Akira squeezing around his knot over and over, if not the noises he was making along with it.

The corners of Akechi’s mouth turned down as he breathed, looking down into that face. This is the man that wanted to take away all of the pain in the world, to impose his irrational, malevolent kindness on to every single person whether they wanted it or needed it. The man that Akira was so shocked would be the owner of a palace that he walked out into the freezing cold just to stare gloomily up at it in the middle of January. The alpha that Akira trusted to take care of him during a heat, a pre-heat that he'd smelled when he was in that metal box underground with him, holding a gun to his head.

 _This_ pathetic excuse for a man? For an alpha??

A growl rumbled in his throat as Akechi grabbed a hold of his hair, his glare sharpening down as he felt the tickle of Akira’s hand move up and over his undulating hips, wrapping his arm loosely around his lower body as his hand splayed over his lower back. Maruki’s eyes widened as his face pressed into Akira’s damp curls, the strain of Akira’s neck as he swallowed Akechi’s cock over and over shifting under his chin, the shift of Akira bracing his head against every thrust into his mouth pressing against Maruki’s tightly closed lips. The alpha’s eyebrows sat low over his eyes as he looked back at Akechi when he let out a slow, deliberate breath, Akira shuddering under him when he did.

Akechi reached up with his other hand and laid it on top of Akira’s head, a muffled whine and renewed scent answering his gesture, sweet and sharp as it cut through both alphas. His chest expanded as he took a breath through his mouth, breaking his breathing rhythm as he collected his racing thoughts, plucking them through the heavy den of hormones and pheromones bouncing around in his head. Fucking into Akira’s mouth with Maruki’s head right behind his...made him feel incredibly powerful.

“Are you just...going to sit there...and sulk?” he asked, jabbing at him with all the coherency and spite he was able to muster.

Maruki doesn’t move at first, staring back at him with a guarded, complicated expression before his shoulder shifts. Akechi watched as he reached with his wounded hand under Akira. The boy between them immediately stiffened before gasping as Akechi freed his throat for a moment, moaning loud as his hips started to squirm. Maruki shuddered and blinked a few times, trying to keep his eyes on Akechi despite the omega he knotted squeezing around his knot even harder with a deep, instinctive need.

Satisfied, Akechi let go of Maruki’s hair and leaned over a bit more, wrapping his hand just under Akira’s armpit, over his ribs, and shifted his hand down to grab a hold of Akira’s hair. A sweet, nasally whine came from the mouth around him.

“You better not come after I do, Joker,” he huffed before throwing off the remaining amount of restraint he’d mustered to challenge Maruki before pounding into Akira’s mouth and throat. His choked off answering moans and muted cries only added to how hot he was, how hot the inside of his mouth was. The hand on Akechi’s back curled its fingers and nails pressed against his lower back and Akechi released pheromones like Akira had deliberately pressed his buttons to make it happen.

Maruki shifted his knees to bend his back and took Akira’s hip with his other hand to hold him steady, pressing his forehead against the slick skin between Akira’s shoulder blades. The pace of his arm jerking Akira off increased and Akira’s whines only got louder. The scent of figgy, cardamom, cinnamon sweetness drenched the air around them, and Akechi could practically feel his brain light up as he breathed it in, felt it race down in his blood and straight to his dick. A hot pressure shifted at the base of his cock and he groaned, knowing he couldn’t knot him even though everything in his body was screaming for him to do it. To take the omega from the alpha a few feet away from him. Knot him so he’s _yours._ So Akira would be--.

His balls felt tight, _fuck--_

“Akira…!” he gasped, watching as the omega’s entire frame suddenly tightened up, his back arching under him and Maruki. He couldn’t smell the cum but he _knew_ it was there, watched Maruki grip his struggling hip painfully tight, like if he let go he’d buck right off his knot, and suddenly all he could think about were figs and heat and sugar and Akira and--

He pulled out immediately and grabbed the base of his cock and squeezed hard as he came, his hips jerking with the force of his orgasm. His grip on Akira’s hair was strong as he sank down on his knees and tried to catch his breath, holding his head against his shoulder. As he held him close, Akira’s gasping, ragged little wheezing noises vibrated right in his ear as he sprayed cum underneath him, his nose and head filled with Akira and a little bit of that enemy whose blaring siren was so distant in the overwhelming shiny colors of Akira’s scent that he could barely register it, but he knew it was there.

The head against his shoulder moved at some point and pulled him out of his orgasm haze, smearing his wet face and nose against his cheek. He somehow hadn’t yet found the ability to be grossed out as he turned a little bit toward Akira’s neck and, despite himself, pressing his mouth against the pheromone gland there, red and bruised as it was. Akira jerked a little and hiccupped, moving his face down to suck at his neck in turn. A warmth lit in his chest as he drank down the happy chemicals directly from their source. He’d never done that before, this before. It felt so good…if a little scary, like he was perched high up in a tree, and just stepped onto a limb that he wasn’t sure could support his weight.

The siren in the fog blared and Akechi opened his eyes, just in time to see Maruki leaning over to try and wedge his hand between them, to cup Akira’s neck and pull him away. Akechi bore his teeth and, without thinking, leaned up and bit down hard on his hand, right into his open wound. The coppery tang of blood immediately hit his tongue as his sharp teeth sank in and a surge went through his body as Maruki yelped and ripped his hand away, worsening his wound in the process. This surge was far, far more familiar to him than the warmth in his chest just a moment ago, and it blew it away like a torrent. He knew that hit to his alpha instincts, and familiarity felt so much less…precarious. The blood on his tongue, the blood of a rutting alpha in his mouth. He wanted _more_.

He stared at him with wide, threatening eyes as he licked at the blood on his lips and Maruki stared back at him, his face pensive, looking to be trying not to immediately fight back.

“Stop it…” Akira rasped out, and the heavy note in his scent weighed down on both alphas, a feeling almost like dread in their chests, and they immediately cooled off.

Akechi took a deep breath through his mouth and let go of his cock, having successfully staved off popping his knot, and reached up to wipe the remaining blood and whatever else was still on his mouth and his face before he shifted back a little, stiffly letting go of Akira, who immediately moved away and let out a wet cough, rolling his shoulders.

Neither of them said anything as Akechi moved a bit to start to dress himself again, carefully putting his outfit back together as Akira wiped at his face, apparently having started crying at some point during everything. Akechi felt a slight, fleeting pang of both guilt and frustration that he hadn’t noticed.

“Still in one piece?” Akechi asked as Akira rubbed at his nose with his gloved hand.

He swallowed and didn’t look at him as he answered, “Yeah.”

So, Akechi stood and started to button up his suit.

After a few minutes of uncomfortable silence, Akira let out a soft whine, which was interrupted with a wet sound as he cleared his throat and Maruki moved behind him and gently, slowly, pulled out, his knot finally deflated. Akira immediately shifted off of his knees to sit down on the floor, leaning his hip on the title and wincing. He was gaping open, and it would take some time for his ass to shrink back down to where it wouldn’t feel so weird to move around. Maruki looked at him a moment, like he was trying to decide what to do, before glancing at Akechi as he fixed his collar and leaned down to grab his helmet and gauntlets that he’d discarded, and quickly started to put his own outfit back together. He hovered near Akira as he acclimated and collected himself even still, ignoring the glasses that remained on the tile where they had been when they’d entered.

Even if the silence between them felt awkward, the noise of their clashing scents was still very loud in the room. Swirling, layered smells of sex, fear, desperation, arousal, and possession were a lot, and the new post orgasm haze that was quickly waning wasn’t making it any easier. Once the arousal was gone, it was clear that Maruki’s rut scent had also waned significantly, and was only an active trickle now in the river of everything else.

When Akira finally moved to start putting his outfit back on, first pulling his underwear up, Akechi tossed the glove Maruki had pulled off at him. He looked at it a moment and smiled a little.

"What?" Akechi asked, brisk.

"You're handing me another glove," he said with tired amusement.

Akechi reached up to his hair and stood, not saying anything in return.

It took some time for everyone to get dressed, but once Akira had put his pants and vest back together, he shifted to get up and Maruki was immediately there to help him up. Akechi frowned before pulling his mask back on, walking over to grab Akira’s coat, which had lain undisturbed by the door.

Akira and Maruki looked at each other as he got to his feet, Maruki’s adam’s apple bobbing, looking a little ashamed. After a moment of looking back into his eyes, Akira brought his other hand up and pressed a life stone into his hand.

“Take this. I hope it helps,” he tells him, quietly. Maruki blinked, opening his hand to look down at what he'd given him. He squeezed his hand shut and let it drop, looking back at Akira. His jaw worked a moment before he settled on nodding, and Akira nodded in return, taking one last moment to surmise him, and pulled his mask down from atop his head. At least for the next few minutes, until he got back home, he was Joker again. He could hold it together and keep any nagging thoughts at bay until then.

"We'll...see you soon," he said, not knowing what else to say. Maruki broke eye contact, his brow pinching with a look of distaste.

He turned then, blinking a couple times as he made his way over to Akechi, who offered him his coat. He wouldn't be able to cover his wobbling gait for a while.

“Let’s go,” he said as Akira took it and shrugged it back over his shoulders. He could feel the dried sweat clinging to the fabric as he did.

Akechi stepped aside as Akira took point and opened the door, glancing back into the room before Akechi blocked his view as he followed him out. Maruki looked tense, still, but not deranged. Not really any trace of the rut version of himself showing outwardly anymore. He just looked anxious, and…despondent.

He turned back as the door clicked shut.

Their outfits turned back to normal as they left the palace, and Akira didn’t realize until they were back out in the dry cold air how oppressive the palace's air had really been. He had known going in, but being inside had felt like such a long time that he'd simply gotten used to it. He felt lighter out here, and yet like he could fall over under the weight of his own body.

Akechi was holding him up by the arm before he realized he was leaning, and he reached up to keep his glasses up on his face.

“I’m taking you back to Le Blanc,” Akechi told him and he squinted and blinked.

“You don’t have to—.”

“That wasn’t a question,” he interrupted, letting go when Akira had straightened back up and it didn’t look like he would fall again.

Akira didn’t have the energy to argue with him as they walked toward the train station, but the come down from being in a clearer air space without so much pulling at his brain and his emotions didn’t make him feel a whole lot better. Not like he thought it would. He almost felt miserable.

It felt a little like when Maruki had left the apartment when he was in heat to go get medicine for him. That instant drop of being left alone and vulnerable.

He shook his head. Medicine. He should take that pill when he gets home…

They made it to the train station fine, with plenty of time not to miss the last train out to Shibuya. Akira raised his eyes as he adjusted the scarf around his neck, looking over at Akechi as they waited for the train on the Rinkai line.

It was out before he realized that he was talking. “Sorry.”

Akechi turned back and looked at him before turning back around, “For what?”

“Pulling you…into all that.”

Akechi huffed and turned around, look seriously into Akira’s face, “You didn’t make me _do_ anything.” He thinned his mouth before adding, “Until your head is clear, best keep your apologies to yourself.” After saying his piece, he turned back around.

That didn’t make him feel any better, but, if Akira wanted to feel better about anything, he knew better than to run to Akechi for it. The problem was, there was a person in particular that he went to when he did feel bad, but now he couldn't do it. This was just another event that reminded him that nothing would ever be the same after this. After winter, even if they succeeded, a part of his life would be missing. Even if he still had his friends and Akechi, if he decided to stick around at all, Maruki...probably wouldn't stay. It wouldn't be the kind of relationship they had before, even if he did. It was important that they win and beat him, there weren’t any other alternatives to consider. He had to do it for everyone, including Maruki himself. Even still…

By the time they arrived in Shibuya and Akechi took his leave, warning Akira in the closest way to concerned he could manage that he better rest tomorrow, it was extremely late, so when Akira was back in the alleyway of Yongen Jaya, in front of Le Blanc, he couldn’t think of much else he wanted to do besides sleep. Sojiro and Morgana seemed to see his exhaustion, so Sojiro let him go up without a fuss and closed the store. Morgana padded around anxiously as he got ready for bed in the still silence of the café.

“Um…Akira?”

He pulled his shirt over his head and turned toward him, listening.

“The…um, you smell kinda different.”

Akira didn’t know what to say, so he gave him a vacant nod.

“Did something happen? Are you okay?”

He wasn’t really sure how to answer that either.

“I’ll be fine in the morning.”

And when he woke up the next morning, he had a hard time remembering why he’d been so exhausted.


End file.
